Ramblings and doodlings of an unsettled mind!

The 2016 which comes with fresh hopes for a better future kicks off with the delightful news from the courts, when the suit by UMNO rebels led by former UMNO Langkawi Wanita member Ainina Saadudin against the party President and Executive Secretary was struck out.

The Star story:

Friday, 1 January 2016

High Court strikes out civil suit against Najib

KUALA LUMPUR: Umno received a “New Year gift” when a civil suit filed by a former member of Langkawi Wanita Umno against its two office-bearers on a “political donation” of RM2.6bil for use and benefit of the party was struck out by a High Court.

Yesterday, Umno president Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak and its public officer Datuk Ab Rauf Yusoh succeeded in their bid to strike out the suit.

In his ruling, High Court Judicial Commissioner Mohd Zaki Abdul Wahab said he found the plaintiff “does not have reasonable cause of action”.

Anina Saadudin had claimed to have filed the civil action for the benefit of Umno and its members.

In elaborating, JC Mohd Zaki said Anina had no legal standing to bring the civil action as she was not a public officer or office-bearer of the party to do so as stipulated under Section 9(c) of the Societies Act 1966.

He said he agreed with the contention of the defendants’ lead counsel Datuk Mohd Hafarizam Harun that only a public officer and the office-bearer of the party would be the competent person to initiate such legal actions.

JC Mohd Zaki said Anina must continuously be a party member in order to be able to bring derivative action.

“It (her status) changes when she was terminated by the party. The plaintiff cannot proceed with the derivative action when she is no longer an Umno member,” he added.

Besides that, he said, it involved internal party matters.

He ordered Anina to pay RM5,000 in costs to each defendant.

Speaking to reporters later, Mohd Hafarizam described the decision as a “good New Year gift for Umno”.

“With this decision, we hope it will put to rest any attempts to put Umno to scandal and public odium,” he said.

Anina’s lawyer Mohamed Haniff Khatri Abdulla said they would appeal against the decision.

“We will carry on to the next level,” said Anina.

She had said she was a lawful member of the party when she filed the derivative action on Aug 28.

Among others, Anina sued Najib for the return of part of the RM2.6bil donation allegedly deposited into a Singapore bank account.

In asking for an account for all monies received by Najib in the form of donations, Anina claimed that the Prime Minister had breached the Umno constitution, the provisions of the Societies Act 1966 and his common-law duties as a trustee.

Mohd Hafarizam had argued that the civil action was scandalous, frivolous, vexatious and an abuse of court process filed with an ulterior purpose which ought to be struck out by the court.

He also argued that Anina had automatically lost her membership when she brought the civil action, as clearly provided for under Article 20.7 of the Umno constitution.

He noted that another High Court had on Dec 7 also struck out Anina’s challenge over the termination of her membership on grounds that it had no jurisdiction to hear the matter.

Mohamed Haniff has applied for the civil dispute to be heard in a full trial, saying that there was no decision ever made by Umno with regard to the RM2.6bil donation.

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The defendants, who have instructed to pay the cost of the case, are determined to rebel on further. Ainina Saaduddin was automatically sacked as an UMNO member when she sued the UMNO President “On behalf of UMNO for the purportedly criminal breach of trust about the RM2.6billion donation”.

More and more allegations in the combined form of manipulated facts and fabricated ones, where incessantly thrown against Prime Minister Najib and were viralised especially in the age and practicality of ICT democracy. This is not without the extensive and intensive input and assistants by the foreign media, many which are controlled by Neo Con Jews with an agenda.

The malicious intent is the strategy to demonise, which were designed to rile majority of the rakyat to the point of anguish and demand, either through party, Parliament or mob street demonstrations to topple Prime Minister Najib.

The manipulation is so intense even a handful of UMNO current and former leaders were taken in and bought into this demonisation game.

However, Prime Minister Najib’s rather cool approached stretched the game further as new information surface and brought forth with substance to dispel fallacy and popular myth, actually drew compounding and added the already multi-facetted stories (which deemed ‘scandalous’ to many!) into a three-dimensional spiralling confusion.

The basis of the allegations were on the over-manipulated commercial deals and decisions of 1MDB, which the bad ones are the basis of the strategy to demonise Prime Minister Najib’s leadership and inadvertently, the Federal Government.

Many confused and equally ignorant blind loyalists of the former Prime Minister drawn up as ‘Minutemen Militia’ against the rebellion to topple Prime Minister Najib, which in the first week of April with the scandalous raison d’être of “RM42 billion of hilang“.

Between 29 May 2015, where the Cabinet was briefed on the ‘Rationalisation Plan’ of the strategic investment company, rolled out a careful plan to unbundle and rationalise all assets, liabilities and deals.

The deal with IPIC in June, the sale of Edra Global to CGN and the final deal of Bandar Malaysia yesterday, brought relief to the stressful cashflow commitments of 1MDB, which was the reason of the financial woes.

Even on the political front, Prime Minister Najib’s July Cabinet reshuffle which saw Deputy Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Mohd. Yassin’s departure since being a member in April 1995 and other Cabinet Ministers proven to be the right judgment call.

Some of the rebellion hopefuls were banking on the rebellion by BN MPs at the last session through the ‘Vote of No Confidence’ motion and some strategic UMNO leaders and more than handful delegates openly demand for their President to go in the party Annual Assembly in early December.

Alas, non avail. BN and UMNO proven to have more confident with Prime Minister Najib to stay on. The immediate next week, Prime Minister Najib and PAS President Dato’ Seri Haji Hadi Awang openly embraced the window of ‘co-operation and working together’, in a clerics conference.

Hence, as the year end drawn and a new chapter has opened, even a strong player in the demonisation game conceded that the tide is turning towards Prime Minister Najib’s advantage.

Pro-Anwarista news portal:

After surviving a rough year, Najib heads into 2016 stronger than ever
BY SHERIDAN MAHAVERA

Published: 1 January 2016 8:58 AM
Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak will be near invincible this year even as he is expected to face more strident calls from within and outside Umno to quit.

Although 2015 was the roughest year of his six-year leadership, the 62-year-old Umno president managed to cement his hold on the Malay ruling party and quash his internal enemies, including the widely influential Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad.

The only real opposition to Najib outside Umno, the Pakatan Harapan parties, are in disarray and are unable to tap into a disenchanted electorate to muster an effective multi-ethnic movement against him.
In fact, Najib has started a subtle yet effective initiative to further divide the opposition and cement his position among the Malay-Muslim masses by courting PAS, the country’s second largest political party after Umno.
In his policy speech at the Umno general assembly on December 10, Najib offered PAS the chance to work together to build a “perfect” Malaysia.
On December 17, Najib and PAS president Datuk Seri Abdul Hadi Awang donned colour-coordinated traditional Malay dress to jointly officiate the Al-Azhar University alumni dinner in Kuala Lumpur.

He reiterated his olive branch towards PAS and urged the two parties to come together for the sake of the Malay-Muslim community.

Hadi responded to these overtures by saying on December 26 that PAS wants to be “adviser” to the Barisan Nasional ruling government, which Umno heads.

For many Malay-Muslim voters, an Umno-PAS cooperation would be a dream come true and any leader who could actually pull it off would stand to gain much goodwill, said Ibrahim Suffian of the independent polling agency, Merdeka Center.

“He can mute criticism towards him in Umno with something as big as this because he will show that he can expand support for Umno.”

One reason why the internal rebellion inside Umno has not caught on is the support Najib has from the party’s middle-ranking division leaders, said analyst Wan Saiful Wan Jan of the Institute of Democracy and Economic Affairs (Ideas).

Although the slow-brewing uprising is catching fire at the lower ranks, it has not been enough to unseat Najib, even when it is being spurred on by Dr Mahathir.

But main problem with the anti-Najib movement, from within and outside Umno, said Wan Saiful, was that there was no clear replacement for Najib and this crippled its momentum.

“The two elements have to come together. You can’t really ask him to resign and yet not provide an idea of who will take over.”

Right now there is no clear replacement. Najib’s estranged deputy in Umno Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin and vice-president Datuk Seri Shafie Apdal have not positioned themselves as replacements.

Both were dropped from their ministerial posts by Najib in a Cabinet reshuffle in July.

Despite having the emotional storm for the charged-up political uprising which have yet materialised, it is a happy new year indeed with Ainina not able to progress further in what shall be a demonisation of UMNO. Politically, it shall be an interesting 2016 indeed.